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By Himanshu Bhatt.  IT is not always that you have a former leader of a nuclear power nation come walking through a street in your hometown. It is also not always that the visitor happens to be one of the world’s top scientists and a revered past president of India.
It is therefore an occasion worthy of record when a figure like Dr APJ Abdul Kalam comes to your doorstep, and then reminds you of how precious a precinct is your own backyard – which you have taken for granted all your life – in the eyes of the world.
The 77-year old Abdul Kalam, who was president of India from 2002 to 2007, arrived in Penang for two days last weekend [in January] in an official visit organised by Khazanah Nasional Bhd.
While the visit was filled with a string of officious appointments, its most poignant highlight must have been a seemingly simple Saturday-morning tour through the island’s "Street of Harmony".
It is along this artery around Jalan Mesjid Kapitan Kling (formerly known as Pitt Street) that one finds religious monuments built more than two centuries ago by the early settlers of George Town, still standing as they had been in the days of yore. It is along this street that one sees different communities engaging in worship with an unassuming neighbourly spirit with one another.
And Abdul Kalam was visibly touched. He moved daintily from one religious site to another as he was guided along this charming inner-city heritage trail by local heritage activists Datuk Anwar Fazal and Khoo Salma Nasution.
In the process, what the diminutive and cheerful personality did was to leave a trail of lessons of his own for our own leaders and communities to ponder.
For as he entered into each of the historic religious sites, he responded with a deep open-heartedness and brimming enthusiasm.
He spoke freely from the pulpit of a Christian church, prayed gently with joss sticks in his palms at a Taoist temple, engaged in a ceremonial aarti at a Hindu temple, and joined in zohor prayers at a mosque.
One could hardly remember the last time any of our national leaders had made an inter-religious tour of this nature on our own shores.
Within the hallowed echoing chamber of the St George’s Church, he stood in front of the cross "to recite the peace prayer of St Francis of Assisi". At the temple of Kuan Yin, the Chinese Goddess of Mercy, he reached out and shook hands, without giving a second thought, with tourists and vagrants alike.
When he emerged from the Sri Maha Mariamman (Universal Mother) temple in Little India, he saw the crowd that had gathered to see him. He went straight to the mike to lead a prayer in Tamil for a blessing from Hinduism’s divine mother of the cosmos.
He was then greeted by the imam of the Kapitan Kling Mosque where he planted a tree and participated in mid-afternoon prayers with a congregation of fellow Muslims.
He showed as much openness and respect as he entered other spiritual sites like the Teochew temple, the Khoo Kongsi clan temple and the Acheen Street mosque.
The tour culminated in a moving speech at the Penang Islamic Museum. Penang island with its bridge, he said, reminded him of his native island of Rameswaram, which is also accessible from the mainland by a similar link.
The past president reminisced his childhood, of how he had been influenced by his father who was an imam of a mosque; as well as by a chief priest of a nearby Hindu Shiva temple and a reverend father who had built the first church in Rameswaram.
"When I was travelling the Street of Harmony, these three people were coming to my mind continuously," he told the crowd. And there is a message for the world, he said, hidden in this unique street.
"The message is human life has got a fantastic dignity," he said. "I saw when I walked along the Street of Harmony that dignity of human life."
He expressed a dream that every teacher in the world would walk along the street to learn how religions could stand together in unity and harmony. "We want schools in the world to learn righteousness of the heart; one of the schools is the Street of Harmony in Penang."
Indeed, it is a school that our own leaders would do well to take lessons from. ** Republished with permission. This feature first appeared in the Jan 7, 2009 issue of theSun.
Himanshu Bhatt is the Penang bureau chief of the newspaper. Editor's note: We missed this article which appeared shortly after our launch in December 2008. We think it is still very relevant, especially in the light of the interfaith debate that has been raging in Penang the last couple of weeks. Related articles
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